Godfrey Weitzel

Godfrey Weitzel (1 November 1835-19 March 1884) was a Major-General of the Union Army during the American Civil War.

Biography
Weitzel was born in Pirmasens, in the Kingdom of Bavaria, and he moved to Cincinnati, Ohio with his family. He became a student at the United States Military Academy of West Point and graduated 2nd of 34 cadets in the class of 1855. In 1859 he returned to West Point as Professor of Civil and Military Engineering after increasing the defenses of the large city of New Orleans, and he was one of the bodyguards of Abraham Lincoln during his inaugaration in 1860, and with the outbreak of the American Civil War, he aided Benjamin Butler in the capture of New Orleans in 1862. Weitzel proceeded to fight in Louisiana and led an army during the Siege of Port Hudson in 1863, and in the Bayou Lafourche Campaign he commanded Union troops against Alfred Mouton. His last battle under Butler was the First Battle of Fort Fisher in 1864; his men were abandoned on the beach by Butler and was transferred to Virginia when Butler was relieved. Weitzel was a veteran of Ulysses S. Grant's Overland Campaign and he took Richmond, and his aide Johnston de Peyster raised the Union flag over the city.

After leading the Union troops occupying Texas, he was decommissioned in 1866 but in 1882 was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel. In 1881 he built the largest canal lock in the world for the Alpena Light, Michigan, but in 1888 it burnt down with much of the town of Alpena. He died of typhoid fever at the age of 48 in Philadelphia.